“You feel like crap, you’re exhausted, you may be sick, you may have a cold. I’ve got arthritis everywhere. … But it all disappears the minute the lights come up and you start walking down a small dark hallway or climbing down into this tunnel. I have no idea what the attraction is. I cannot tell you how many times a day I say to myself, ‘Why am I doing this? Why do I have to go there?’ I have no answer for it.”
Author: Matthew Westphal
Met Opera And ENO Commission Second Work From Nico Muhly
The two companies, which developed and premiered Muhly’s recent Two Boys, will work with the composer on an adaptation of Marnie, Winston Graham’s 1961 novel (made into a film by Alfred Hitchcock) about a woman blackmailed into marrying one of her bosses after she gets caught embezzling.
Your Pocket Guide To This Year’s Oscar Controversies
“While we all know about the major controversies underpinning this year’s [awards race] – such as the shameful lack of diversity in this year’s #OscarsSoWhite nominees – no film is immune from its own internal drama. Here’s a look at some of the specific quarrels and criticisms that have plagued 10 of this year’s nominated films.”
Those Who Stay: The Lives Of Writers’ Companions
“We often know very little about those who live closely and share the lives of the writers about whom we apparently know so much. Part of this is wilful mythologizing. We like to think of the writer as indestructible as the text, preferring not to imagine who might make them breakfast in the morning or help them put on their shoes when they are too old to manage it by themselves.” A look at “Miss Alice” Lee, Ted Hughes, John Bayley, Leonard Woolf, and Valerie Eliot.
Multicolored Birds, Giant Flowers, And Heads With Wings Are About To Devour Philly
Well, its museums, anyway. The Museum of Art, U. Penn, the Free Library, and Winterthur are all featuring Fraktur, the wildly colorful and whimsical Pennsylvania German folk art: “Drawings of hybrid fish with the heads of men. Humans mottled like snakes. Long-tongued lions.”
Florence Shuts Down Its Ballet Company – For The Second Time
Two years ago, the Teatro del Maggio Musicale, facing the same cash crises that afflict most Italian opera houses these days, announced that it could no longer afford to maintain its ballet company, called MaggioDanza. Supporters put together a private entity intended to maintain the troupe at the theater. It didn’t work (and they’re all suing each other), so MaggioDanza will close after all. (in Italian)
How The L.A. Phil Is Facing The Future
“‘Our audience is segmenting. There isn’t such a thing as a classical music audience. There are dozens of classical music audiences,’ said Chad Smith, the Phil’s vice president of artistic planning. ‘We want to be seen as relevant to what’s happening in our world. L.A. is the most contemporary city. You miss a beat and you are forgotten.'”
When Your Countrymen Turn On Your Best-Foreign-Language-Oscar-Nominated Film
Pawel Pawlikowski (Ida): “It’s not a nice feeling, and I also feel a bit embarrassed for my country, which I’m very proud of in most ways. When it happens, and they said Ida is an unpatriotic embarrassment, I think, ‘My movie’s not embarrassing. This is embarrassing.'”
Guthrie Theater Names New Artistic Director
“His name might not have been on the handicappers’ shortlist, but Joseph Haj’s appointment Tuesday as artistic director of the Guthrie Theater brought waves of acknowledgment and praise. ‘He’s a huge player on the national scene – one of the finest theater artists working in America today,’ said [former NEA head of theater] Ralph Remington.”
If Too Many Arts Professionals Come From “The Elites”, Well, Whose Fault Is That?
“Judi Dench, David Morrissey and Julie Walters have all lamented [working-class folks’] absence. But, interestingly, they each talk about the opportunities for working-class kids that existed 20, 30, even 40 years ago, when they were establishing their careers. What has changed between then and now has nothing to do with the socially and ethically conscious people that largely make up our arts sector.”